It is not an easy task to pinpoint the underlying elements that unite the conservative rebellion. Some analysts, focusing on the movement's political leadership, have viewed matters cynically. Ronald Reagan, George Bush, and their ilk are simply members of the established and wealthy business elite who have tapped the resentments of ordinary people in order to attain power and provide others of their class with tax and regulatory relief. In this view, "hot button" issues like school prayer, abortion, and gun control can be used "as a means to ignite people who do not normally support Republicans," in the words of one conservative political adviser. Such an analysis emphasizes the differences within the conservative movement. On the one side, libertarians and free-enterprising businesspeople would keep the government out of regulating public morals as well as out of regulating the economy. On the other side cultural conservatives urge the government to take an active role in restoring morality.

Other historians concede the existence of this split but stress the cultural roots that unite both sides: the rejection of a liberalism that brought activism to government and a secular perspective to society at large. Conservatives of all stripes, these historians argue, hold up the values of a purer past, one free, in their view, from government interference and invigorated by a clearer moral order. In 1955, when William F. Buckley Jr. began his conservative magazine, National Review, he proclaimed it his job to "stand athwart History and shout Stop!" In the eyes of some historians, it is this fixation on a past—an idealized one, at that—that unites the new right. "People became conservatives," suggested one analyst, "when they experienced 'the horrible feeling' that a society they took for granted might suddenly cease to exist."

1			Begin by reading the Contract with America. What promises does this document make to the American people? What seem to be the basic philosophical principles behind its view of government? Why does the author of "Conservatism and the Rise of Ronald Reagan" argue that this ideology became more successful during the 1980s and 1990s? Do you find these arguments persuasive? Why or why not? http://www.house.gov/house/Contract/CONTRACT.html http://countrystudies.us/united-states/history-136.htm What is the argument made in "From the Editor Approaching Conservatism"? How much do you think contemporary politics influences the teaching of history in schools and universities? Should it? If not, can such biases be avoided? How? http://www.oah.org/pubs/magazine/conservatism/moore.html